Leaderboard

In order to have a valid temple recommend, yes you are required to be up to date on child support. Which probably means the lady in question lied about it to her bishop & the Lord. Honestly, that puts her in way more of a bad spot than other any mortal could make her. If you're seeking to get this child support, I would reach out through legal channels.

Temple recommend questions - question #12: I usually don't recommend going to someone else's bishop to "tell on them". What's the point? If it's revenge, or trying to manipulate or force behavior out of the ex, y'all will have to ask yourselves if those are worthy reasons to act upon. It's just that for every 100 people who say something like "I'm worried about their soul, and want their bishop to be able to give them help appropriate to their struggles", I figure maybe 95 of them are lying to themselves, and it's really just a way to lash out at the person.

What's said is that some of the stuff Marnie says makes a lot of sense. Lest I sound like a total nutcase, a lot of this wanderlust has nothing to do with family, more like the adventure of living in a new place. Just would like to daydream about this without guilt.

The idea and feeling that the missionary is being punished, is simply wrong. While it is understandable why that feeling exists it does not make it any less wrong. The truth is the missionary is not being punished... he is being protected. Hundreds of thousands of faithful Saints are regularly praying for the safety of the missionaries. And the hand of God is reaching out (through his servants) and protecting this one, very clearly in this case. But like in many cases the individuals in question do not see the hand of God in their lives when it is happening. Missionary assignments are done by the same revelatory process that the church teaches its members to use. The leaders study things out, make a choice, take it to the Lord for confirmation. This is the spirit of revelation, the spirit of prophecy, this is what has called and assigned the missionary in question to where he is now. It is not unheard of for a missionary to develop a medical condition while serving. When this happens it becomes something the leader include in their study for assignments. While missions always have some dangers, it is unacceptable for a leader to purposely endanger a missionary by sending them some place they can not get the care they need. Now one might be thinking that the leader's screwed up, and it is possible, our leaders are human. That is where faith in the Lord comes in. COVID might have caught our leaders by surprise, but it did not catch the Lord by surprise. An emergent medical issue might have caught a missionary and our leaders by surprise, but it did not catch the Lord by surprise. Our leaders might even screw up and forget about a missionary for a while, but the Lord never will. Every missionary can exercise faith that he is exactly where the Lord wants him to be. The only question we need to ask is "Are we going to serve God with all our heart mind and strength even when we did not expect to be where we ended up?"

I agree with your mother. I agree with you more, but I think your mother has the kernel of a true idea that she doesn't quite comprehend or know how to bring about. I wish I could tell her, or better yet, show her. What will a family look like in Zion, in the celestial kingdom? Parents will not "control" their adult children. Parents will instead glory in the adult nature of their children, in their maturity and ability to handle situations even (or especially) when the adult children's handling of a situation is different from how the parent would have approached it. But make no mistake, parents will interact intimately with their children, even as adults. They will be much closer than best friends, but with the added intimacy of being father and son or mother and daughter, or any permutation thereof. It will truly be heaven. Your mother senses this at some level. She may have an intellectual picture of what she thinks things will look like. Maybe she just feels sadness over the possibility of losing her precious daughter's presence, and wants to hold her children close and help them. That, too, is an outgrowth of the idea of a true family community. Your mother's problem is the problem all of us have in this state; namely, that we're mortal. This is not heaven, not yet. It is our duty to bring about heaven—but that is not something that is accomplished overnight, or in a week, or truth be told even in a single lifetime. It is a distant goal we work toward. To tell you what no one actually needs to say: You must do what is best for your husband and yourself, for your children, and for your parents and siblings, pretty much in that order. That risks hurting your mother's feelings, which is too bad. (Really, it is too bad. Truly regrettable.) But such are the hard choices that adults must make.

I think he memorized it English while waiting for the waiter at the restaurant the night before.

I appreciate you sharing this. I didn't go on a mission, so I might have some naive ideas about it. Everyone talks about how their mission was the best, and you don't hear about the difficulties as much. I hope that my son will be like yours and look back with satisfaction and gratitude for the experience. He also paid his own way, so I hope he feels good about that sacrifice, as your boys did. Thank you for giving me some hope. I do appreciate it. Maybe I need to get counselling, too, so someone can talk me through all of these feelings! I will struggle to love and support his decision tbh but you are right. He's hurting deeply. I wish I could talk him into staying. It's only 3 more months, but he's not getting transferred and will have been in the same place for 7.5 total months.

Hi mama, I'm sorry to hear about the troubles you and your son have been going through. So, we got a few things going on: - Not being transferred to the "original" mission assignment. Yeah, that is a major rainy-day. COVID sucks. There could be a million reasons for how things are going the way they are, lots of it not related directly to your son himself-- stuff like covid restrictions, visa complications, etc. It's miserable, but honestly not much anything any person can do. My deepest sympathies. - As to your son receiving medical treatment: any adult must consent to counseling and/or medication-- everything must be done with your son's approval. HIPPA laws forbid telling an adult's medical treatment to another person. If you son choose to tell you about his medical stuff, then he can. But other people legally cannot. This is the same as if he were to be in college dorms, just living & working on his own, etc. I worked at a college for many years, particularly with freshman for many years and... like I had cases where students were being beaten by their boyfriend, suicidal, major medical issues etc. Legally, these were private matters and I was not allowed to discuss with others including their parents (there were exceptions for police, Student Affairs, etc). Speaking personally, my first two years of college were a disaster and I worried my mother sick. I was depressed, anxious, hated my surroundings, etc. But it did turn out alright. If you want to talk more, feel free to shoot me a PM.

Friend, your son was not called to go see the world and gain valuable personal experience sure to result in endless entertaining anecdotes and sacrament meeting talk fodder for the rest of his life. Your son was called by an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ to be Christ's representative to a dying world—to preach the Good News of his atonement, which brings us redemption, salvation, and even eternal life. I really think that both you and he are focusing on the wrong things. Again, I'm not without sympathy. But at some point, a man who would follow the Good Shepherd has to drop his preconceptions and personal demands, and simply kneel in submission before Christ. I'll go where you want me to go, dear Lord, over mountain, or plain, or sea. I'll say what you want me to say, dear Lord; I'll be what you want me to be. The lack of contact from your stake president about your son's emotional condition seems strange to me. You might consider having a serious conversation with your stake president to find out what's going on there. As for communication with the mission president, that occasionally occurs when a missionary is having trouble, but in general it does not. I don't believe my parents ever spoke with any of my three mission presidents at any time. I have been where you are now. In the end, your son needs to know that it's his decision and that you will support and love him in any case. But your son probably needs to hear your encouragement and your faith that things will turn out for the best. Let me get a little bit personal here. My three oldest sons have all served missions, two domestically and one in a distant country. Unlike their father, who loved his mission and breezed through it largely untouched by anything really bad (and, perhaps not coincidentally, largely ineffective in preaching the gospel), all three of those sons had real struggles. All three seriously considered coming home. One even received medication and counseling for depression while in the field. All three ended up staying, even the one whose mission president unfairly and wrongly misjudged his character—and, to be fair, who apologized to his face when he finished his mission. I think that none of the three looks back on his mission with fondness as a fun or exciting experience, but all three look back with satisfaction at the good work they accomplished and the lives they helped, both of their investigators and of their companions. I believe all three are grateful for their experiences, even though it cost them tens of thousands of their own dollars and put them two years behind in their educational and professional efforts. From the experiences of my sons, I have become convinced that it's entirely possible to struggle during your mission, to have hard and even traumatic experiences, to have to grit your teeth and endure much of the time, and still come off your mission a better, stronger, more whole man than you were when you went out. For what it's worth.

In my line of work, I talk to many stepmoms with similar situations and I always ask the same question: What would be the purpose of talking to the Bishop about it? It is a very valid and important question you need to ask yourself. If the issue is the fact that she is behind child support payments, then as it was suggested here, there are legal channels to address this. But when you bring up the Bishop, then something tells me that this isn't really about the fact that she isn't paying child support but the fact that she has a Temple recommend and you perceive that fact as "unfair" or "wrong" or like you stated "the only thing that may register to her that what she is doing is wrong." Granted, everyone is entitled to their opinion but not everyone should be entitled to act upon that opinion. First, because this person is not your ex. But your husband's ex wife, the mother of his child. Therefore, it is up to your husband to decide what he would like to do (if he chooses to do anything about it) and I'm quite sure that as a responsible parent, he would choose to take the legal route so he can have the funds to continue supporting his child. But this is something between him and his ex-wife. Of course, with your support as a stepmom. I understand it might be very upsetting seeing someone "getting away" with something we consider "wrong" but there are other legal channels to address it ( IF the issue is really child support payments) but if the purpose of calling the Bishop is to expose her, to shame her, to "correct" her this is not the way to go about it and frankly (and I say this without any disrespect or animosity) none of your business.

I remember laughing at the Marnie letter, but I've always felt she was pretty much savaged without real cause. On rereading the letter, it's very picky, almost anal-retentive, but it's not offensive. She wants stuff to be stackable, so says no aluminum foil. I can grok that. On the video, she seems like a woman who probably has a well-developed sense of humor, but it's not developed in a manner most of us are familiar with. I bet she's a delightful person if you know her well. I bet God loves her, and probably her family too.

Whenever I watch that interview, I cheer for Marnie when she weighs the emotionally intense backstory and simply answers, "She's family.... love her."

I've gotten to know half a dozen divorced guys over the years. I do not envy the burden of trying to be good disciples, while dealing with the fallout of a divorce, having to make hard decisions with that force winners and losers. Trying to discern whether those harsh decisions are made out of selfishness or righteousness. Good luck you guys!

This is a great answer and so very helpful! He's my oldest and I'm used to having a say as a mom! It's hard not being in the loop. My son was the one who told us about his treatment, but he only mentioned it a little. And I had never considered that they wouldn't tell me, so it caught me off-guard and was so weird. But, I totally get what you're saying here and it's a fact of life I have to get used to as my kids grow up. Thanks for your understanding, and I hope it turns out all right in the end!

Thank you so much for your reply! I know what you mean, this is how it was originally! It was tough, but then it became personal when the country opened up and they starting sending missionaries back. He was the only one not sent, presumably because of the mental health treatment. Thank you for your sympathies. I get the sense that people don't understand fully how difficult this year has been for the missionaries. Maybe they do...it's been hard for all of us, no matter what phase of life we are in.

Healthy relationships include healthy boundaries. How much physical distance than involves is entirely up to you & your hubby. Some relationships are able to live physically very close and maintain those healthy boundaries (my brother-in-law is that way). Others (like with my mom) having some physical distance helps out. I live 2.5 hours from my family, so we can visit for a weekend, but no one is showing up unannounced for dinner -- I like that, and it makes for a much better relationship with my folks than when I lived in the same town. A super-simple-example of this: up until I was 32 years old, any time I would visit my mother and stay at her house (because I don't live close by), towards the end of the visit she would walk into my room (against my express permission), collect all of the dirty laundry, and take it upstairs to wash it with all of the extended family's. THIS DROVE ME BONKERS!!! I'm an adult: I can wash my own clothes! And would like to do so in my own home where I don't have to figure out who's socks are who's! (And inevitably getting it wrong and accidently taking somebody else's clothes). Despite my years of protests, she would always do this-- meaning well and trying to be helpful. It to a LOT of convincing to get her to stop and respect my request in this regard. Conversely, my brother-in-law loves it when his mom does his laundry.... It's just a different relationship.

Just curious, have you ever lived outside of Utah before? Outside of Utah as a couple? Outside as a family? Life out in the 'mission field' has many wonderful benefits. I agree with others, it is 100% up to you and your family. No. One. Else. Not even Momma Bear. Some of my better relationships are with family who live away from us. My son, now on his mission, values his family tremendously - hah!

By "the family" you mean her family, right? I believe that once you're married, your spouse and children are your family. The rest are relatives. If she means your family too then....R-U-N. lol At the end of the day, it is a decision between you and your husband. No one else. Don't feel pressured, generally relatives want you to do things to satisfy whatever needs they have with little consideration about how YOU feel. Do what is best for your and your family.

Whether she’s right or not, is solely, 100% up to you. It’s not her choice to run the family, it’s your choice to let her run yours. It’s always easy to give advice from this far away from the situation, so here’s my advice: If such things are sort of a news flash to you, then you’re still a certain part dependent child. Move away, visit occasionally, have them over occasionally. After a year of distance, you’ll look back to the days when your mom still ran so much of your life, and you’ll see how much you have grown.

My niece was recently baptized... For the filler time between the baptism and the rest of the service they handed out a postcard size paper and a pen. And asked everyone to write a note to my niece. I had never had that happen before but I though it was pretty cool. After the service was over we were invited back to their house for lunch...

Babylon Bee wins gold again with their article:

Full disclosure - I can easily see a totally happy couple, doing everything God wants of them, still deeply, deeply intertwined in a very close extended family of siblings/aunts/uncles/cousins, with one elderly matriarch pulling the strings. Some people really love a Marnie running the show.

Show me a man who doesn't want someone else to do his laundry, and I'll show you...a woman...

Upon what are you basing this assumption and why are you so sure your assumptions are not frivolous speculations? The Traveler

He and His feminine spirit and all His (their) sons and daughters have and partake an entirely different nature than the nature of this universe, which belongs to other (satanic) elohim.

the impact of the roman all male version plus its overlay and definition by greek concepts foreign to scripture has been to create more confusion . modern christianity has resulted. a mess.